The Battery Today Widget in iOS 9 is Amazingly Useful

I forgot to mention this yesterday in my sleeping with Apple Watch piece, so here’s a shiny new article for a neat little thing.

iOS 9 brought all sorts of little improvements to iPhone. One of my favorite features is a small but wonderful one: the battery today widget. Here it is, in all its glory.

Battery Today Widget

Okay so what’s the big deal? I recently turned off battery percentage in the status bar because iOS 9’s new Low Power mode practically obviates that.1 It’s nice that I still have quick access to the percentage in the Today view (even though that number tends to make me anxious).

The bigger deal is that it tells me my Apple Watch battery percentage. Prior to iOS 9, the only way I ever checked remaining power on my Apple Watch was with the battery Glance. I refuse to put the battery complication on any of my faces.

The power consumption on Apple Watch is so good I’m rarely worried about it running out of battery. I really don’t want to know the battery percentage most of the time. When I do, though, pulling down the Today widget is fast and easy. Plus it even tells me if it’s plugged in with that little lighting bolt. Should I not know where my watch is, that’s a nice clue.

I like this feature best when I’m charging up before bed. I can plop my watch on the bedroom charger and retire to the couch. Without getting up (key to late night relaxation) I can see how my Apple Watch’s charge is progressing. That way I can tell if it’s got enough of a charge to make it comfortably through the night before turning off the TV and heading to bed.

It’s a small but useful convenience. Enough little conveniences add up over time, and that’s why I’m pretty happy with iOS 9 and watchOS 2.


  1. When the iPhone battery gets down to 20%, it prompts me to throw the phone into Low Power mode, which I pretty much always do. In Low Power mode you don’t have an option: the percentage shows in the status bar. ↩︎